The Director General of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), Prof. Mohammed Sambo has said that the new NHIA Act 2022, is designed to make health insurance mandatory for all Nigerians even as the authority has trained Community Mobilisation Officers (COMO) of the National Orientation Agency (NOA), with a view to drive grassroots enlightenment on the health insurance scheme in Akwa Ibom State.
At the training workshop for NOA’s personnel in Uyo, the Akwa Ibom State capital, Sambo explained that health insurance is to give people access to affordable quality health care regardless of their economic status and that insurance is not only for civil servants but for people in the informal Sector as well.
Represented by the Acting Director of Media NHIA, Mr. Emmanuel Ononokpono, Sambo said the training is geared towards creating knowledge, and education as well as attaining Universal Health Coverage (UHC) in the country.
Further, he said the agency is to enlighten Nigerians living in rural communities in the state and to ensure that more people are captured in the scheme.
He said: “Today, NHIA is collaborating with the National Orientation Agency to train community Mobilisation Officers to the extent that they can bear the message and transmit same at the various local levels. The fundamental of the training is to ultimately see that every Nigerian wherever they may live hear about health insurance.
“We adopt this strategy to increase health awareness because Nigerians need enough information to enable them to have access to affordable and quality health care”.
Akwa Ibom State Coordinator of NHIA, Mr Williams Ebiokobo said Health Insurance is the sure pathway to achieving the desired health outcomes in the Nigerian populace and ultimately Universal Health Coverage.
He explained that health insurance provides Financial Protection against rising medical costs, Peace of mind without financial pressure in case of medical emergencies, Affordable Healthcare Lifetime renewability (as with GIFSHIP with no age limit), Cashless hospitalization and Network of hospitals
Ebiokobo stressed that health insurance was not only limited to civil servants earning monthly salaries, adding that the scheme has various programmes such as Group, Individuals, and Family Social Programme (GIFSHIP) that covers both villagers, artisans, and other categories of people in the society.
He, however, noted that low awareness and funding have been the major challenges confronting the agency.
He expressed optimism that the collaboration with NOA will step up awareness and the new NHIA Act will also help to develop innovative ways of financing the health insurance scheme.
Also speaking, the Director-General of NOA, Dr. Garba Abari assured that being an agency to disseminate all government policies and programmes, NOA will take NHIA’s activities to the grassroots.
Abari represented by the Director, of Human Resource Management, Mr Kehinde Ogunkuade noted that the health of all Nigerians also remains the concern of the agency, adding that a “healthy manpower produces a healthy development”.
“NOA is interested in taking the programme to the grassroots so that all Nigerians will benefit from the activities of the NHIA. Health is important to every Nigerian and we want Nigerians to be healthy.
“Information is power. If you don’t have information about a thing, you won’t have trust in it and that is why we have to take the information to the grassroots”, he added.
